the sisters on Maui

Saturday, September 21, 2013

This is the view from our apt. we're the tiny building amongst the
tall ones.

my apartment is a one bedroom on the third floor. the windows are
the kind that don't close and there's no AC. but we do have one very beloved
fan. We don't have hot water in our sink. we have wood floors in the kitchen/
living room. we have a carpet bedroom and a tile bathroom. We have two small
plastic tables pushed together for our study desk, one old recliner from a ward
member, a weird glass table in the corner that we don't really use and a dresser
with three drawers each in our bedroom.

we have plenty of shelving, plenty of
cockroaches and a mold- free shower curtain. There is a pet cat that lives in
our parking lot named celery. and a gimpy bird that I named gregory.

we live in
the ghetto- as previously mentioned- so there is a lot of smoking, police sirens , and sketchy people who sleep in the park next door. But we have nice
neighbors and a great stove and fridge too!

Monday, September 16, 2013

Last week on pday we went on a hike!
There was a part where you could either continue on by climbing up the rocks
next to the waterfall, or you could just wait at the bottom. I waited with one
of the Samoan ward sisters that did not want to climb, and sister McKinney went
up with the other Samoan ward sister. Then about a half hour later, that sister
came back down by herself. I was like "hey where's my companion?" and
she told me that she had gone up further with some others . So we just waited
at the bottom. We started to get a little bit worried. So the Zone leaders went
back up to look for them. About 20 minutes later they came back down by
themselves. They couldn't find them! I was thinking "awesome......i
totally lost my companion in the forest....that's so not ideal!" We got down to the cars and they
weren't there so I turned around and started running to go back to the
waterfall. After about a minute, I ran into the zone leaders and they were like
"where are you going?" I told them "back to the waterfall."
they were like "um...we can't let you do that" I’m like "ya, but
I lost my companion!" and they're like "but you can't just go running
off into the forest by yourself........that would just be one more person that
we're responsible for if anything bad happens." They kinda had a
point....it's probably never good to run off into the forest by yourself
anyway. So the zone leaders and I drove up the road to see if they had hiked
far enough to get onto the main road. We didn't find them, but while we were
heading back we came across an ambulance and a few police cars dealing with
something on the side of the road. I was like "this really isn't
good......". we kind of slowed down, but couldn't see any one that we recognized.
Then we got a call saying that they were back at the cars. I was so glad to
hear that everyone was safe and everything was okay. We found out later that
the elders were catching crawdadsand
sisterM couldn't just hike back through
the forest alone. haha.........18 year old elders seriously need to keep an eye
on the time..........

On September 11th, we got to do
service at Pearl Harbor. We got to clean out the sick bay. ( she did not
mention which boat…hahahah ) It was really neat to be there on such a special
day. Then we toured the boiler room afterwards.

After the service, we went to a
lunch appointment. It was Mexican food: Horchatta, burritos and some sort of spinach/bacon/cream
cheese chicken. I don't like milk, so sister McKinney drank her horchatta and then
slyly switched cups with me and drank mine too..... the only problem is, if you
drink it, they pour more. So She had to drink two more cups of horchatta! And
she doesn't like bacon or chicken, so I had to eat her chicken thing....well
most of it. We got outside and I whispered to her "I have chicken in my
skirt". She was like "What!!!??" . this is becoming a common occurrence.

Our Pad got fumigated this day also.
We had do bag up almost EVERYTHING!!!!!!! Our car is like a hobo shopping cart it
has so much stuff in it!!!! We spent $40.00 washing every item of clothing and
bedding that we own.

We are having a lot of success
working with members that are “less active”. It is really neat to see how much
everyone just needs love. That solves almost ANY problem. We are working with one sweet young lady to
prepare her to go through the temple now that she is coming to church again. After
she was baptized, she moved and she hasn't gone to church in years! She
recently started coming back and she is doing so well!!!!! We love meeting with
her.

We helped another lady bag up all of
her food because her house is going to be sprayed for termites....we know how
that feels.... we did a LOT of bagging this week.

Our 1st councilor in the bishopric
came to us after a meeting and said that he heard from a missionary who
recently got home, that we had found a man hanging in our park.........my ,word
spreads so quickly! And I don't know if I already mentioned that a sister
serving in Hawaii kai asked me if I was the sister hodgson who found the guy
hanging in the park next to my house......um yep that's me...... she said that
she heard from her mother. crazy!

Also, we took our car to get it;s oil changed and while we were waiting, we
walked around a little shopping center. A guy sitting out in front of a plate
lunch window restaurant said "you look hungry" we were like "o
we're fine but thank you!" he insisted that we get a drink at least and
then went on to order us hamburgers and fries as well. The Hawaiian people are
SO hospitable!!! but we can't eat all of this food!!!!!! he said we look like
we're losing weight... BEST. COMPLIMENT. EVER!